


Red Land

by sevenofspade



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ancient Egypt, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-03
Updated: 2016-05-03
Packaged: 2018-06-06 05:50:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6741076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenofspade/pseuds/sevenofspade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey finds an unlikely tomb to rob.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Red Land

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ancarett](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ancarett/gifts).



> DID SOMEBODY SAY "ANCIENT EGYPT AU"?
> 
> I hope you enjoy reading this!

The sand was burning under Rey's feet, but she and sat went through her gear again anyway, making sure everything was there and intact. 

Staff. Chisel and hammer. Bag. Rope. Amulets for protection from Setesh, Anubis, Wadjet, Osiris, Sekhmet and Ma'at. Rey's most prize possession she kept folded tight against her skin, a Setesh scroll to protect her from the sandstorms. She had an ankh, a djed and an eye of Horus bound to the leather trip that tied the scroll to her body. 

She was as ready as she would ever be. She had waited as long as the sun had let her; she needed to enter the tomb now, before the high noon heat mummified her on the spot. 

Opening the tomb on her own was not her idea of a good time, but she had no choice. She had nothing left she could sell and the flood this year had been low, leaving the crops unbountiful and the price of cereal higher than it had been in decades. She needed to eat. She would not wait until the land of the dead to reunite with her parents.

She made the opening as small as she could, in the -- vain, she knew -- hope that it would prevent anyone else from entering the tomb. She was not as small as she had once been, and a tomb once opened would be stripped within a week, regardless. She had to get anything valuable out as best as she could. 

The inside of the tomb was dark, just a shaft of light illuminating the first few feet. It reflected off some gold further inside, but Rey would not go inside without paying homage to the spirits of the dead. She reached out, finding the hieroglyphics on the wall. They were carved nice and deep, so she could read them by touch. After a few moments, she realised she had been reading them the wrong way around -- no wonder it hadn't made sense! 

Then she reached a rip in the rock and her heart stuttered in her chest.

She ran her fingers against the wall again. She took a step to the side and did the same with the other wall. Here too the name was chiselled off the limestone. She should not be here. No one should be here. This place should not even exist.

This was the tomb of Akhenaten.

Worse. The King's father. Nebkheperure was a child-king, but he was king none the less and Rey would have no dealing with kings, except the ones she robbed.

So. 

She was in the business of robbing kings, but kings long dead, not heretics who had lived and breathed while she was a child. She remembered the way the sands had seemed so silent and alien when the priests at the Niima oasis had said there was no god but Aten. Even then she had known this to be a lie.

Aten was a god, but so were Setesh and the rest of them. Setesh was her god, how could he not be? She was from the foreign land from beyond the Nile, a desert dweller, a child of the storms with lightning thundering below her skin.

She pulled her arms back to her side and leaned her staff against the wall.

She had exhausted her last stores of food as she had waited to see if anyone else knew of this tomb. She had not eaten in days and even her water tasted of sand more than anything else. No one had come by in weeks. She could rob this tomb, there was no one to stop her or find her.

By touch and little light, she started feeling for the gold. She would take nothing sacred if she could avoid it, but there was gold enough in ceremonial swords and chest hinges, even for Plutt. The chest fell open as she fiddled with the hinges.

There was a flicker of movement before her.

She jumped back, grabbed her staff and whirled into an attack position. She saw... She did not know what she saw.

A sha, Setesh's blessed animal. Faces. A staff made of light, like the was of Ra. More faces. A desert of bleak white sand and angry black trees. Faces again, some human, some not -- and always, always the voice of Setesh -- her god was speaking to her, she was made for great things -- 

_These are you first steps_.

**Author's Note:**

> The title comes from an Ancient Egyptian euphemism for the desert, one of Seth's domains.
> 
> I've taken as little liberties with the period as possible, but as information on this period of the XVIIIth Dynasty is hard to come by, it is possible mistakes were still made.
> 
> This fic posits that Akhenaten was, however briefly, buried in another tomb between the Akhetaten necropolis and [KV55](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KV55), in the Valley of Kings (assuming, of course, that the mummy in KV55 is indeed Akhenaten). 
> 
> I've chosen to refer to Tutankhamun by his name of Sage and Bee, Nebkheperure, as it was most likely the name he would be referred to by his contemporaries, having left behing the common use of his name of son of Ra, Tutankhamun, at coronation.
> 
> [Setesh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_%28deity%29), [Anubis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anubis), [Wadjet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wadjet), [Osiris](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osiris), [Sekhmet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sekhmet) and [Ma'at](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maat). [The Set animal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_animal). [A was](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Was). [An ankh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankh). [A djed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djed). [An eye of Horus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_of_Horus).


End file.
